R551201G. Men and Women.
Bell’s Weekly Messenger, 1 December 1855, p. 6.
Addendum to The Brownings’ Correspondence, vol. 22.
The poetical materials, of which these volumes consist, are of varied quality. There is much in them indicative of deep thought and elegant expression; but there is also a large amount of mediocrity, which strangles the better effusions, and renders them powerless. Mr. Browning has fallen also into the miserable fault, which, in a great measure, owes its origin to Tennyson, of putting plain prose into a sort of hybrid versification, which is neither poetry nor prose, and runs into extravagance, which can never be too severely reprobated. This is the more unpardonable, for when Mr. Browning will give his genius play, he aspires to all the characteristics of a true poet. What can be more elegant than the following, taken at random from one of the dramatic pieces?—
Constance. You did not hear, you thought he spoke
Of love? what if you should mistake?
Queen.No, no—
No mistake! Ha, there shall be no mistake!
He had not dared to hint the love he felt—
You were my reflex—how I understood!
He said you wore the ribbon I had worn.
He kissed my hand, he looked into my eyes,
And love, love was the end of every phrase.
Love is begun—this much is come to pass,
The rest is easy. Constance, I am yours—
I will learn, I will place my life on you,
But teach me how to keep what I have won.
Am I so old? this hair was early grey;
But joy ere now has brought hair brown again,
And joy will bring the cheek’s red back, I feel.
I could sing once too; that was in my youth.
Still, when men paint me, they declare me—yes,
Beautiful—for the last French painter did!
I know they flatter somewhat; you are frank—
I trust you. How I loved you from the first!
Some queens would hardly seek a cousin out
And set her by their side to take the eye:
I must have felt that good would come from you.
I am not generous—like him—like you!
But he is not your lover after all—
It was not you he looked at. Saw you him?
You have not been mistaking words or looks?
He said you were the reflex of myself—
And yet he is not such a paragon
To you, to younger women who may choose
Among a thousand Norberts. Speak the truth!
You know you never named his name to me—
You know, I cannot give him up—ah God,
Not up now, even to you!
Constance.Then calm yourself.
Queen. See, I am old—look here, you happy girl,
I will not play the fool, deceive myself;
’Tis all gone—put your cheek beside my cheek—
Ah, what a contrast does the moon behold!
But then I set my life upon one chance,
The last chance and the best—am I not left,
My soul, myself? All women love great men,
If young or old— it is in all the tales—
Young beauties love old poets who can love—
Why should not he the poems in my soul,
The love, passionate faith, the sacrifice,
The constancy? I throw them at his feet.
Who cares to see the fountain’s very shape,
And whether it be a Triton’s or a Nymph’s
That pours the foam, make rainbows all around?
You could not praise indeed the empty conch;
But I’ll pour floods of love and hide myself.
How I will love him! cannot men love love?
Who was a queen and loved a poet once
Humpbacked, a dwarf? ah, women can do that!
Well, but men too! at least, they tell you so.
They love so many women in their youth,
And even in age they all love whom they please;
And yet the best of them confide to friends
That ’tis not beauty makes the lasting love—
They spend a day with such and tire the next;
They like soul,—well then, they like phantasy,
Novelty even.
Contrast this specimen, in which power and delicacy predominate, with the following slapdash vulgarities, in the style and rhyme of Beulah's comic songs, such as, “All to astonish the Browns,” &c.:—
Is it ever hot in the square? There's a fountain to spout and splash!
In the shade it sings and springs: in the shine such foambows flash
On the horses with curling fish–tails, that prance and paddle and pash
Round the lady stop in the conch—fifty gazers do not abash,
Though all that she wears is some weeds round her waist in a sort of sash!
All the year long at the villa, nothing's to see though you linger,
Except yon cypress that points like Death's lean lifted forefinger,
Some think fireflies pretty, when they mix in the corn and mingle,
Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a–tingle.
Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is shrill,
And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the resinous firs on the hill.
Enough of the seasons,—I spare you the months of the fever and chill.
Ere opening your eyes in the city, the blessed church–bells begin.
No sooner the bells leave off, than the diligence rattles in;
You get the pick of the news, and it costs you never a pin.
By and by there's the travelling doctor gives pills, lets blood, draws teeth;
Or the Pulcinello-trumpet breaks up the market beneath.
At the post-office such a scene-picture—the new play, piping hot.
And a notice how, only this morning, three liberal thieves were shot.
Above it behold the archbishop’s most fatherly of rebukes,
And beneath, with his crown and his lion, some little new law of the Duke’s!
Or a sonnet with flowery marge, to the Reverent Don So–and-so.
Who is Dante,Boccaceio, Petrarea, Saint Jerome, and Cicero.
‘And moreover’ (the sonnet goes rhyming, ‘the skirts of St. Paul has reached,
Having preached us those six Lent–lectures more unctuous than ever he preached.’
Noon strikes,—here sweeps the procession! our Lady borne smiling and smart
With a pink gauze gown all spangles, and seven swords stuck in her heart!
Take the next extract we have fallen upon, the first and last verses of a short lyric:—
It was roses, roses, all the way,
With myrtle mixed in my path like mad.
The house–roofs seemed to heave and sway,
The church-spires flamed, such flags they had,
A year ago this very day!
****
Thus I entered Brescia, and thus I go!
In such great triumphs, people have dropped down dead.
‘Thou, paid by the World,—what dost thou owe
Me?’ God might have questioned; but now instead
’Tis God shall requite! I am safer so.
Is this poetry? We rather think not. We cannot be surprised that publishers should declare that poetry is a drug. Can it be otherwise, when men of talent, which Mr. Browning doubtless is, with all the qualifications too to become a real poet, stoops to be the copyist of an overrated genius, who has done as much to degrade the art by his absurdities, as he might have elevated it, had he been content to be natural. There is ample room and verge enough for Mr. Browning in the walk he has chosen. Let him adhere to the beaten track, and not run out of the way to write finely, which is but extravagance run mad, and he may take a position, creditable to himself and agreeable to the public.
Reviewed:
Men and Women (RB), London: Chapman & Hall, 1855.
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